The Best Of Modern In Dallas Issue 08

apr ‘20

// cadwallader design // highland park residence

West East Collection

crystal case

RICARDO BELLO DIAS + STUDIO ORNARE

Dallas Design District - 1617 Hi Line Drive, Suite 190a, Dallas, TX, 75207 - (214) 377 1212

@ornareusa | www.ornare.com

1019 Dragon Street | Dallas | Design District | 214.350.0542 | www.sminkinc.com

ZEN // california desert residence

by Kendall Morgan

& THE ARTOF INTERIOR DESIGN

// bluffview residence

Dallas-based David Cadwallader brings a meditative approach to every project.

Known for his use of open space and a judicious blend of art and furnishings, interior designer David Cadwallader has built a quietly successful career over the past four decades. So it might be surprising to learn that the designer came to his chosen industry in a rather roundabout fashion.

“I saw images of Italian modern design and a light bulb turned on—I thought it was something I wanted to do,” he recalls. “I was always aware of design, and my parents built a very modern 1950s-style house, so I’ve always had an attraction to it, but it wasn’t something I was conscious of.”

Raised in Central America by missionary parents, Cadwallader grew up admiring classical Spanish and mid-century modern architecture. Upon returning to the United States, he followed his brother to Baylor University in Waco when a chance encounter with an interiors magazine led him to change career paths.

Taking a two-year break from college, Cadwallader learned how to run a studio in New York from the ground up as operations manager—from proposals to purchase orders to installations. He ultimately returned home to earn his bachelor of science in interior design from the University of Texas in Austin.

2 Homes Available

Museum Tower 1918 N. Olive Street Dallas, TX 75201 Missy Woehr + Ilene Christ missy.ilene@compass.com M: 214.213.9455

// california desert residence

A position as an assistant at a Dallas Design Center-based firm followed, and Cadwallader began his portfolio with small hotel projects across the state. After 11 years working for the award-winning firm Joyce K. Wynn Incorporated, he launched his eponymous company in 1983 with the plum assignment of creating William Noble Rare Jewel’s flagship in Highland Park Village.

“With a residential project, it’s about representing the client’s personality,” the designer explains. “The level of formality or informality, the level of what you might call quality, and I call soul. I guess you learn a lot of it, but it’s also intuitive, and I’ve really been able to hone that capacity to tune into what the client’s character is and reflect that.”

Despite delivering projects like a recent revamp of Noble’s shop and his 2018 transformation of Houston’s oldest hotel, The Lancaster, Cadwallader says he actually prefers working in residential design.

Eschewing trends for simple and clear lines, Cadwallader will upgrade rooms with furnishings he feels have “design integrity,” taking clients three or four steps beyond where they currently are. Even with sky’ s-the-limit financial

budgets, Cadwallader prefers to mix furnishings of all levels he feels are “worth it,” much in the same way a fashionista might pair a thousand-dollar pair of Louboutin heels with Levi’s jeans.

“I try for an effortless balance in the whole composition and selection of furniture—the scale and the lines. Its that capacity to blend elements—the high and the low. It’s always about the quality, and not so much the price.”

“Throughout any enterprise, Cadwallader focuses on his self-created tenets of design.

First and foremost, he clarifies a client’s intent and how their home needs to express their personality and needs.

Aligning with the client, architect, and contractor, he then develops a clear direction that sets the foundation for a structure’s plans, design drawings, and diagrams—a “road map” of sorts for the future finished product.

With this in place, he nurtures and augments a clients’ personal expression with his design vocabulary. By establishing the colors, textures, and forms they respond to, Cadwallader can edit and guide their choices. What is rejected from a former abode can often be as crucial as what is kept. Throughout this stage, the designer prefers

// highland park residence

// highland park residence

contemporary pieces that not only look good now but will also hold up for 20 years or more.

Design bibles such as Wallpaper and Azure magazine occasionally serve as inspirations, as does the work of legends like Billy Baldwin and Angelo Donghia. With an aesthetic that is calm and welcoming yet never austere, Cadwallader even refines a client’s art collection, sourcing new works from such sources as Barry Whistler Gallery, Cris Worley Fine Arts, Conduit Gallery, Holly Johnson, and Talley Dunn.

Finally, he collaborates with suppliers, tradesmen, and creative craftsmen, persisting until a home reaches its harmonious, balanced whole. The final rooms feel spacious yet complete, with just enough accessories to bring warmth without the sensation of being overwhelmed by clutter.

Cadwallader states, “I’m not satisfied and won’t let the client feel satisfied until each aspect entrusted to me expresses a harmonious and welcoming quality – this means that it is pragmatic and honest in its function and

// facade and entry at santa fe residence / photo: robert yu

// bluffview residence

FORTHCOMING IN JUNE FROM TEXAS A&M UNIVERSITY PRESS FIRE AND ICE: THE ART OF ROGER WINTER

KIRK HOPPER FINE ART

DALLAS

Sunflowers , 1983, silkscreen edition of 50, 39 x 40 in.

ROGER WINTER

// highland park residence

reflects the character and quality of the homeowner.”

Intuitive in its essence, his approach leads to lasting relationships of trust and gratitude in both directions, a crucial reason clients return to him, again and again, to make their dream homes a reality (sometimes even into a second-generation).

As a longtime practitioner of transcendental meditation, Cadwallader’s zen attitude has allowed him to define his success on his own terms, far away from the whirl of press clips and cocktail parties.

“I’m not into the glamour of it, I don’t have that focus on that kind of representation of myself,” he says. “I’m much more interested in the meditative aspect of life, and I hope that’s reflected in my work. My general attitude is my homes hopefully reflect my sensibility of being calm and harmonized. As the Buddhists say, it’s all temporal. We say everything is urgent, but it’s not important.” cadwallader.us

// bluffview residence

by Kendall Morgan

THE ARTIST’S WAY

From Impressionism to abstraction to magical realism, Ginger Fox expresses herself with style and substance.

rely on her to furnish every wall in their home without ever repeating an artistic genre.

The work of most artists is instantly identifiable, whatever medium they may explore. This is decidedly not the case with Dallas-based painter Ginger Fox.

From the very beginning of her career, Fox was difficult to pin down. Inspired by her neighbors across the road in her small West Texas town of Texline (population 350), Fox learned how to paint, sculpt and weld at the age of 11.

Fox dabbles in abstract flora, abstract expressionism, landscapes, portraiture, atmospheric abstracts and surrealism, to name a few. Her imagination—and her technique—holds no limits, which means collectors can

Post high school, she worked as a bartender, floating from Aspen to Santa Fe to New Orleans through her late 20s, until she decided to attend the Art Institute of Dallas for graphic design and advertising.

VISUAL COMFORT TECH LIGHTING GENERATION LIGHTING MONTE CARLO FANS PHILLIPS COLLECTION SHADOW CATCHERS ART EMISSARY HOME BLISS STUDIO

“always to the trade only”

2000 N Stemmons Frwy Suite 1D111 Dallas, TX 75207 214.651.9565 taylorsdallas.com

But, as her classmates explored the classic form of life drawing, Fox said she realized, “there was something wrong with me.”

to make each work too detailed, so the idea of moving into the sphere of fine art made fiscal sense.

“I was creating two or three pieces to their one, and they were all in different styles,” she recalls. “I was really playing with it and trying to determine my voice. At the end (of the semester), we all knew whose style we were looking at, but mine kept evolving. Ever since I’ve tried this and that, and I just keep doing it.”

Fox had also figured out how to create a shiny lacquered finishes with acrylics, and her high gloss canvas of a levitating apple helped solidify a style some might consider surrealism, but which she dubs magical realism.

Soon, her earthbound still lifes were drifting towards the sky in a dreamlike fashion and, as Fox says, “Man did I get good at clouds—and clouds are a bitch!”

Fox ultimately quit the Institute in protest over the firing of the head of visual communications, but quickly found work as a decorative artist in the early ‘90s heyday of faux finishes. Her time spent painting epic backdrops of marble or stone led to her first full-scale mural. She was losing money in decorative art because of her propensity

Though the artist was approached for representation by a local gallerist, she decided to sell the work herself, reserving her exhibitions for out-of-town spaces in Austin, Cincinnati, Chicago, and Memphis. By 2012, she had opened an eponymous space in Bishop Arts, selling paintings and showing the work of other artists. When a Design

District showroom contacted her to create some abstract canvases, those took off, too, and she complimented her original Oak Cliff gallery with a 5,000-square-foot space on Dragon Street.

“It didn’t matter what genre I was working in,” recalls Fox. “I was developing and selling different genres. It ended up we stopped showing other people and started showing my magic realism, my abstracts, and my Texas roadside series. I was experimenting and creating all this stuff, and it was all successful.”

Fox credits her then longtime partner Lara Humphrey with running the logistic end of things so she could paint up to 200 canvases a year.

But once the 16-year relationship was winding to a close, so was Fox’s ability to keep two galleries running while satisfying her clients.

Downsizing to a private studio in 2019 allowed Fox to maintain a “one-stop shopping” space where clients can see the broad range of work while engaging with the artist herself. And no longer running a consumer-facing space meant she has even more time to explore her creative options. She’s particularly excited about a recent series of canvases called “Power Club” inspired by her mom.

Some of Fox’s six-foot-tall Glamazons have made their way off the canvas and into life-size paper dolls she toted around town for photo ops until the recent lockdown. Others are

starring in witty little videos created in collaboration with Ted Matthews (like her beehived “Ball Buster” who laser guns supplies of vegetables and toilet paper into an empty supermarket).

Perhaps because of her versatility, our current quarantine has seen Fox busier than ever. She even recently hired a social media expert to manage her Facebook and Instagram, so she has time to paint more commissions in her Design District atelier.

“I just completed two commissions for a couple who saw my work in an ad in a local magazine, and I have another client whose goal is to buy one of every genre. I’m grateful and pleased and want it to continue,” she laughs. “I was a little concerned with everything going on and businesses closing, but I continue to get clients buying and ordering from me, so knock on wood!” find out more about gingerfox

// photo : steve clicque

Remembering

by J. Claiborne Bowdon

Virginia Savage McAlester

I never knew about Virginia Savage McAlester. I felt the loss, along with many in Dallas, when The Elbow Room wasn’t spared. My knuckles have gone white at every careening turn the saga of Fair Park has taken.

I continue to wait and see what fate has in store for the gas station owned by Clyde Barrow’s father and the Kalita Humphries Theater. Yet through all of these instances of tense investigation, and countless other situations where the future of Dallas’ past was in doubt, I failed to learn about Dallas’ own living landmark. McAlester passed away on April 9, 2020, and, as I’ve come to find out, she was more than the right person at the right moment for historic preservation- she helped create the movement.

In the 1970s Dallas, like so many other urban centers around America, was showing the effects of the prior decades of migration to the suburbs. The once celebrated neighborhoods of the city were abandoned or uncared for. Swiss Avenue was among them, where McAlester had spent her adolescence, and found herself again as an adult. She would work to have the neighborhood designated a historic district- it was the first in Dallas. The years that would follow would find her helping to found or guide just about every preservation group in this city.

Of course, Swiss Avenue, and Dallas’, problems of were not unique. Homes, neighborhoods, buildings, everything that was a part of what a city in America had been- that had carried it and generations of its inhabitants to the moment where what had been might cease to be- were in danger. McAlester published her book, A Field Guide to American Houses, in 1984. It would help many to see the significance in the houses destined to be bulldozed, and would encourage people all over the country // photo : steve clicque

// photo : steve clicque

both to and how to fight for them. The book does not just note characteristics. It takes the time to discuss why those characteristics are there. Why “we” put them there.

It is why Angela Serratore of The New York Times Magazine described it as “The most authoritative dictionary of the language spoken by the built environment.” The descriptions, photographs, and blueprints, are instructive, but the book’s purpose, McAlester’s purpose, is to make it plain that when we lose the structure we lose our understanding of it, and by extension ourselves. We will only ever know its facsimile.

In this moment of “shelter in place”, perhaps we understand this better than ever. Technology allows us to communicate with our loved ones. We can even stand at windows and place our hands over theirs through a pane of glass, but the distance, even by millimeters, robs us of connection. We are strangers to so much that is special in the world we inhabit. However, we endure these hardships so that we may preserve that which is special. Virginia McAlester worked to ensure that we would not live in ignorance of our past or with the regret of the loss of it, so that we may reach out and touch, and feel, and know, and appreciate.

fine mid century and modern design

Dallas 1216 N. Riverfront Blvd Dallas, TX 75207

New York 200 Lexington #1059 New York, NY 10016

circa20c.com

MODERN SPACES

11468 Strait Lane // $3,695,000 JANELLE ALCANTARA c: 214.455.6542 janelle@galaxymodern.com

8179 San Benito Way // $1,595,000 JACOB MOSS c. 214.335.1719 jacob.moss@compass.com

5935 Hillcrest Ave # A // $945,000 FAISAL HALUM c. 214.240.2575 fhalum@briggsfreeman.com

1918 Olive Street, Unit 701 // $1,500,000 MISSY WOEHR + ILENE CHRIST c: 214.213.9455 missy.ilene@compass.com

// scott+cooner dallas

@25

by J. Claiborne Bowdon

Scott + Cooner are celebrating their twenty-fifth anniversary this year.

For twenty-five years they’ve faced rugs, chairs, tables, anything and everything one can find in a home (and the home itself), with the skill and confidence it takes to have begun then and still be here today — celebrating, but looking forward, as always. Scott is Lloyd Scott, and Cooner is Josy Cooner Collins. They were introduced by Josy’s former husband, and both recognized and valued what each brought to the table. Both were excited about modern and wanted Dallas to be excited about modern. // josy cooner collins + lloyd scott

You need only look around at the number of chateaus and Mediterranean villas that sit side by side throughout the city to this day to understand the uphill battle they both faced. It’s easy to take all of the butterfly roofs one sees nowadays for granted. Twenty-five years ago Target was not “tar-jay.” Ikea had yet to plant their flag in Frisco, or anywhere near Texas. Most people in Dallas’ experience of “modern” were limited to visits to the Dallas Museum of Art, North Park, or perhaps a trip to The Container Store.

Appliances could be “modern” because that was technology. You expected that to be new and different.

A chair, however, was not something that needed improving on in most people’s minds. When it comes to furniture the default for comfort and a display of success in that day and age was a kind of Ponderosa meets English gentry. Many will remark on the ubiquity of chintz, heavy carved Victorian cabinets, and vases of enormous size with dried assortments of vegetation. It’s only now that you can hear someone remark that just when

// poliform mondrian sofa

You’ll definitely look like a great cook.



Show off your culinary acumen in the Alea kitchen from Poliform.

Dallas 1617 Hi Line Dr. Ste. 100 214.748.9838 Austin 115 W. 8th St. 512.480.0436 scottcooner.com

// cassina 551 super beam sofa

they think they’ve sold a Barcelona chair to every single person in Dallas someone else comes through the door.

Consider also the challenges endemic in Josy and Lloyd’s field. They must be at the vanguard of the “new”.

They must both understand the value of something unknown, and help others to see it as well. They must do this year in and year out- day to day. As Lloyd put it, “One of my favorite things vendors tell me when they’re trying to sell me something is when they say ‘This is our bestselling thing, and we sell a lot of it in New York.’ The minute I hear that I go the other way.”

You don’t help create a taste for modern in Texas by transplanting what’s popular in New York. You do it by finding what will be popular in Texas because you know Texas and you know Texas people. When asked, the two terms each hears the most when clients are discussing what they’re looking for are “individual” and “comfortable.”

Both of these words are quite revealing because they show common prejudices are still in force. For many “modern” still means spartan and uniform, but at least twenty-five years later they’re open to it.

And that’s all that Josy and Lloyd need. It’s all they’ve ever needed. Someone just needs to be willing to open themselves up to a new possibility and suddenly they find themselves with an embarrassment of riches of European modern. Perhaps the greatest secret to their success isn’t simply the knowledge, drive, and carefully curated selection of pieces they have to offer. They’ve made modern more approachable to Dallas because they’re so approachable. Ask anyone about Josy and Lloyd and the Scott + Cooner showroom and you hear about nothing but the fun and warm atmosphere they’ve created. They’re not afraid to do things differently.

In fact, one of the first things that you notice about their showroom is the mix. Pieces are paired for the aesthetic harmony or tension that they bring out in each other, not their being part of one brand or one collection. See that Tom Dixon Melt floor lamp in their virtual showroom video? It’s no accident that the shade of the natural wood on the chair and side table just steps away work so well with it. Lloyd notes “European designers and manufacturers all want their own little section with no other vendors mixed in. We’ve never displayed that way. We’ve always mixed, which is the way the designers buy. It’s better when it’s mixed.”

The search continues on. For Josy the designer that deserves more attention is Paola Lenti, an Italian designer that began her own design company around the same time Josy and Lloyd were beginning their partnership. Her designs are characterized by simple organic shapes with fluid lines and her innovative woven and knit materials. For Lloyd it’s Verpan by the late

// moooi meshmatics chandelier

// walter k 375 chair and 375 sofa

// verner panton clover leaf seating system

Verner Panton. It’s a brand that’s existed for over fifty years, and is boundless in its inventiveness. Both of these designers share a sense of fun and whimsy that makes an immediate connection.

When you ask them what they wish they had done differently twenty-five years ago Josy has no regrets, “Nothing.” Lloyd simply wishes they’d gone ahead and purchased a showroom in the Design District. No surprise really. They live for what’s going on in the moment and fully embrace it. It’s what’s carried them all the way to this moment, and what will carry them to the next and the next. scottcooner.com // paola lenti orlando

Engage Educate Experience Enjoy

The Dallas Architecture Forum is for everyone who wants to experience inspired design. The Forum presents an award-winning Lecture Series that brings outstanding architects,interior designers, landscape architects and urban planners from around the world, as well as Symposia, Receptions at architecturally significant residences, and Panel Discussions on issues impacting North Texas.

ď‚‚ď‚

dallasarchitectureforum.org

OPENING SPRING 2020

LUXURY RESIDENCES | DALLAS ARTS DISTRICT

SIMPLY THE BEST HALL Arts Residences offers the perfect blend of art and living with an exclusive collection of up to 48 luxury homes in the heart of the Dallas Arts District.

HALLARTSRESIDENCES.COM 214.269.9535 | info@hallartsresidences.com

UNDER CONSTRUCTION FROM $2 MILLION Each OfďŹ ce is Independently Owned and Operated.

The designs, features and amenities depicted are subject to change and no assurance is made that the project will be of the same nature as depicted or that the project or the condominium units will be constructed. This is not an offer to sell, or solicitation of offers to buy condominium units in states where such offer of solicitation cannot be made.

modern

cravings // solanas round chill bed designed by daniel germani available at scottcooner

// bonbori outdoor table lamp designed fumie shibata available at brokis

// aire coffee table available at greenspace

your modern

calendar

Modern events and activities make for fall fun around the Metroplex.

JoĂŤl Andrianomearisoa + Jose DĂĄvila + Friendswithyou* Dallas Contemporary

2020 Nasher Prize Laureate Michael Rakowitz Nasher Sculpture Center // through May 03

The Perilous Texas Adventures of Mark Dion The Amon Carter Museum of American Art // through May 17

Sandra Cinto: Landscape of a Lifetime The Dallas Museum of Art // through July 05

Alonso Berruguete: First Sculptor of Renaissance Spain The Meadows Museum // through July 26

Mark Bradford: End Papers Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth // through Aug 09

Beili Liu The Crow Museum of Asian Art of The University of Texas at Dallas // through August 16

Dreamer of Houses The Dallas Museum of Art // through Jan 31, 2021 Due to the current COVID-19 restrictions, please confirm availability of viewing these exhibits.

modern

art galleries

Modern art, exhibits, around the Metroplex.

Emmi Whitehorse + Don Redman + Lynn Randolph Kirk Hopper Fine Art

Norm Diamond Afterimage Gallery

Maysey Craddock + Isabelle Du Toit Cris Worley Fine Arts

Dahlia Woods + Chris Lattanzio Dahlia Woods Gallery

From A Distance Ro2art

Signs Of The Times PDNB Gallery

Seeing 2020 Laura Rathe Fine Art

Whole Cloth Site 131

Abhidnya Ghuge + Damian Suarez + Damian Suarez Craighead Green Gallery Due to the current COVID-19 restrictions, please confirm availability of viewing these exhibits.